Late night fright: Crabs pull ahead in eighth, hold on to beat Pearl 5-4 in series opener

ARCATA -- With a full moon in the sky, things were bound to get a little weird.

The late innings of the Humboldt Crabs' 5-4 victory over the Neptune Beach Pearl on Friday night at the Arcata Ball Park confirmed that.

With a the game knotted at 3-all in the bottom of the eighth, Humboldt used a station-to-station approach -- two walks, a hit batsman and a sacrifice fly by Clay Cederquist -- to take a 5-3 lead.

In the top of the ninth, Crabs closer Thomas Cortese had trouble finding the strike zone for the second straight outing, with the Pearl cutting the score to one run after a ball in the dirt on a swinging strike three got away from catcher Peter Miller.

Steven Thompson, who came into relieve Cortese with two outs in the ninth, got DH Alec Dowell to strike out swinging to end the ballgame.

"I'll definitely remember this one," said Crabs skipper Matt Nutter, who celebrated his 300th win afterwards. "I remember No. 200 up in Medford, and this one was no different."

The late-inning drama took away from what was looking like a pitchers' duel in the early goings.

Lefty starters Drew Bradshaw of the Crabs and the Pearl's Michael Theofanopoulos both threw the ball in what turned out to be another close, hard-fought battle in the Humboldt-Neptune Beach rivalry.

The Pearl were the first to get on the scoreboard, scoring three runs in the top half of the second.

First, catcher Trevor Ellison drove in a run with an RBI single that took a nasty hop past Crabs third baseman Sergio Sanchez. Then, two batters later, leadoff hitter Derek Nakasato dropped an run-scoring double just inside the left field line to double the Pearl's lead.

Neptune Beach's third came in controversial fashion, as Crabs Sanchez chose to attempt to tag out Nakasato heading to third instead of throwing across the diamond for the third out of the inning.

It was ruled that Sanchez missed the tag, allowing Marquise Gill to score and make it 3-0.

"We got a couple of breaks," Pearl manager Brant Cummings said. "But we weren't able to add to our lead. Three runs up here isn't enough in my mind.

"Give credit to their pitching. We got three off of them early and then they put up some zeroes."

But Bradshaw settled down nicely after the second inning, sitting down 13 straight hitters before he issued a walk to begin the sixth. He allowed just three hits and struck out seven in 6 2-3 innings of work.

Jacob Coats picked up the win out of the bullpen, throwing 1 1-3 no-hit innings in relief of Bradshaw.

"Drew's just a bulldog," Nutter said. "Some younger players might let that kind of stuff get to them, but he doesn't. He gave us a chance to win and that's all we needed."

Sanchez redeemed himself at the plate three innings later, crushing a two-run double to the 394-foot wall in left-center field to tie the game at 3-3.

Nick Minteer gave the Crabs their first run of the game an inning prior on a groundout to second base, scoring Cameron Olson.

"They never get down," Nutter said of his team. "It's just battle, battle, battle."

With the win, their sixth straight, the Crabs improve to 4-1 in the Far West League and 14-3 on the season. The Pearl fall to 3-3 in league play and 8-9 overall.

The two teams continue their four-game series today with a doubleheader beginning at 4 p.m.